The Chicken and the Egg

Where does development begin? Every where you look in Rwanda there is a non-profit organization trying to make life better here. It makes you ponder who is doing it correctly. Should we be worried about getting books into their hands and teaching them English if they are consistently getting worms because of unsafe drinking water? Should Internet accessibility be a priority if there are still children being malnourished while living in destitute poverty? Should I bother centering a project around mental health when there are water shortages?

They are building a railway linking Tanzania and Rwanda. There is a new international airport being created in the East. Fiberoptic cable is being placed along all the roadways, spanning out to the rural villages. The electrical cables are slowly making their way to my village. New construction is everywhere.

But where is the water?

Can you create a successful business if there isn't consistent water? Should you risk farming new produce if you can't properly irrigate it? Can you move onto critical thinking about freedoms and rights when you can't feed and hydrate yourself?

I realize everyone should try to help Rwanda's development in their own way. We were all created uniquely for a reason, with different sets of strengths. But the more I consider my role in Rwanda, the more it keeps coming back to the water. and not just because every time I step out my door in the morning Tabita tells me how much she wants my water.

* A couple days later I came back to this post and noticing a glaring error. Why should the first question I pose about development ask what foreign aid organizations are doing for Rwanda? What is Rwanda doing for Rwanda? If you are interested, Vision 2020 is a must read. It is the ambitious plan of development that the government of Rwanda created for itself. So now, not only do I think water is crucial but sanitation is taking over the lead. What a great idea to have proper waste management throughout the country. Some of the goals are just laughable. Will 100% of the population be literate by 2020? Of course not. But it's nice to dream. I let my mind wander and imagined time speeding up. I wish everything moved as fast as Rwandans are trying to make them move.

Things to look forward to:
public libraries being built
electricity reaching some of us rural villages
internet fibers reaching many, many places in the countryside
new national airport being built bringing the grand total up to two Rwandan airports
railways linking Rwanda to regional trading partners
new universities being started to promote the knowledge-based industries

*Personal update on my electricity situation: It really is coming! Now everyone is jumping over to the optimistic side of the electricity debate. They say in two weeks we should have electricity…which is hard to deny when you can actually see the wire coming closer and closer to the village. Still unclear whether the wires will reach to my house, where there are no poles. By now I'm quite comfortable cooking with my kerosene stove so probably won't buy a hotplate after all. But charging my phone and computer at my house would be lovely. Random sidenote: I ended up at the hospital after dark last night (no, not by myself; and the hospital is my workplace, I wasn't ill or injured). I had to run into the office to get something and the generators were running, as they do all night, every night so that doctors can actually see the patients. There were little clusters of secondary students sitting around the hallways studying. They were using the electricity to get in a few extra hours of studying. I am constantly amazed by how dedicated these students are to their education and how hard they have to work to get something that so many Americans take for granted. I will happy to see the school get electricity so the students don't have to worry about walking to another part of town at night just to get their homework done. Ahh, development.